Psalms 78:9 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

The children of Ephraim, being armed, turned back in the day of battle “This defeat of the Ephraimites,” says Dr. Hammond, from Kimchi, “was in the desert: and although the story be not mentioned in the books of Moses, yet it is written in the Chronicles, (see 1 Chronicles 7:21-22,) where, from the circumstances of Ephraim's mourning, it appears it happened before the Israelites entered into Canaan; and the manner of the relation shows it was a considerable slaughter.” Bishop Patrick, however, supposes it refers to the Ephraimites refusing, with the other tribes, (which they probably discouraged,) to go up and engage the Canaanites, when commanded of God, as is recorded Deuteronomy 1:26. But the most probable opinion seems to be, that it refers to that shameful defeat which the Philistines gave the Israelites in Eli's time, when they took the ark, as is related 1 Samuel 4:10-11. Shiloh, which was then made desolate, was in the tribe of Ephraim, and perhaps the Ephraimites on that occasion led on the battle, but, by giving away afterward, caused a general defeat. “That Ephraim is here put for all Israel,” says Poole, “seems evident from the following verses, wherein the sins upon which this overthrow is charged are manifestly the sins of all the children of Israel, and they who are here called Ephraim are called Jacob and Israel, Psalms 78:21. And the psalmist, having related this amazing providence and judgment of God upon his own people, falls into a large discourse on the causes of it, to wit, the great, and manifold, and continual sins of that and the former generations; which having prosecuted from hence to Psalms 78:60, he there returns to this history, and relates the sad consequences of that disaster, namely, the captivity of the ark, and God's forsaking of Shiloh and Ephraim, and removing thence to the tribe of Judah and mount Zion.” Well might that event be fresh in men's minds in David's time, which was only about forty years after it; for the ark, which, in that memorable battle, was seized by the Philistines, though it was quickly brought out of captivity, was never brought out of obscurity, till David fetched it from Kirjath-jearim.